autumn days have a holiness that spring lacks ... They are like old serene saints for whom death has lost its terror.

Most of the basic truths of life sound absurd at first hearing.

The sun is still there... even if clouds drift over it. Once you have experienced the reality of sunshine you may weep, but you will never feel ice about your heart again.

She long ago accepted the fact that happiness is like, swallows in spring. It may come and nest under your eaves or it may not. You cannot command it.

All human beings have their otherness and it is that which cries out to the heart.

In a world where thrushes sing and willow trees are golden in the spring, boredom should have been included among the seven deadly sins.

The child in us is always there, you know, and it's the best part of us, the winged part that travels farthest.

Happy the man who lives long enough to acknowledge his ignorance

Not quite birds, as they were not quite flowers, mysterious and fascinating as are all indeterminate creatures.

He grinned at her, and she grinned at him, and it seemed to Maria that suddenly the sun came out.

Peace ... was contingent upon a certain disposition of the soul, a disposition to receive the gift that only detachment from self made possible.

The work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives and the dreams shall never die.

Art must take reality by surprise.

That's my lesson for taking a vacation: vacation will kill you.

It is the easiest thing in the world for a man to look as if he had a great secret in him.

If all human beings understood history, they might cease making the same stupid mistakes over and over.

It's okay to be ambitious, it's okay to be over-prepared.

Here's the real thing. Democrats got to understand that the first line in the Republican playbook is going to be smear, you know? And there's nobody who's going to be able to avoid it.

If you're cooking for someone important - whether it's your boss or a date - never try a new recipe and a new ingredient at the same time.

I don't think [Donald] Trump was playing rope-a-dope. He probably said, "Look, I've done these. How many debates did we do in the primaries? I know what's happening."

In place of equal respect, the nation offered women the Miss America beauty pageant, established in 1920-the same year women won the vote.